Railers get strong, timely play on both sides of the ball to secure 35-34 homecoming win

[October 02, 2021] It took 47 minutes and 43.4 seconds of the 48-minute game to be decided, but the LCHS Railers earned a victory in their homecoming football game with a 35-34 win over the Mattoon Green Wave.

“It feels great,” LCHS senior Scotty Battin said of the first homecoming win for the Railers during his four years. “All the other games meant something, but this was super special, not only for the team, but for the whole community.”

Scotty Battin

The victory evens Lincoln’s overall record at 3-3 on the season and 2-2 in the Apollo Conference.

Echoing the sentiments of Battin, Lincoln head coach Matt Silkowski said after the game that the Railer victory was especially meaningful for the seniors and other team members who have stuck with the program when the victories didn’t come quite as often.

“We had some that didn’t want to stay committed to the process who up and quit on us and didn’t come back,” he said. “And these guys did [return], and I’m so happy to see the rewards of that. I think those are the ones who understood the bigger picture of what we were doing in the spring and developing guys.”

Silkowski said that, in preparing for this week’s contest, he reviewed video of the last contest Lincoln played against Mattoon, a 42-18 Green Wave win in April during the COVID-impacted 2020-21 school year.

“I watched our Mattoon game from the spring in our scouting this week, and we weren’t very good,” he said. “We didn’t deserve to win. But now our guys are deserving to win those games, so I’m happy for them that they put themselves in the position to win.”

Mattoon jumped out to an 6-0 advantage on its first possession of the game when the Green Wave seemingly drove the ball downfield at will against Lincoln’s defense, capped by a 19-yard touchdown pass from Jackson Spurgeon to Kaleb Wright.

However, the Railer offense answered back to take an 8-6 lead with a TD of its own on a 5-yard run by Isaac Decker followed by a 2-point conversion on a pass from Elijah Pollice to Jaden Leadley.

Jaden Leadley

Mattoon looked like it might pull away from the Railers, as the Green Wave scored 16 unanswered points on 1-yard TD run by Spurgeon, a 2-point conversion on a pass from Spurgeon to Taeriek Grace, then 8 points on an 8-yard TD pass and a 2-point conversion, both from Spurgeon to Matthew Gordon.

Looking up at a 14-point deficit, It would have been easy for the Railer players to give up and throw in the towel. However, rather than wilt, the team willed itself back into the contest with strong play on both sides of the ball to close out the first half. The Lincoln offense quickly put the ball in the endzone with a 4-play, 62-yard TD drive capped off by a 30-yard touchdown run by Pollice to cut the margin to 7 at 22-15. Then the Railer defense took a stand, forcing Mattoon to punt on a fourth-and-5 situation to give Lincoln the ball on its own 34-yard line.

Ki'on Carson

Lincoln then looked to complement its outside running game with some inside runs as it turned to senior running back Tony Gandolfi. The 6-foot senior opened the drive with a 7-yard run, the first of three runs he had on the drive for 17 yards. Railer Ki’on Carson used his speed on mostly outside runs to gain 44 yards on 4 carries during the 8-play, 66 yard drive. After Isaac Decker scampered into the end zone on a 10-yard TD run with 2:24 remaining in the first half, Lincoln had cut the deficit to 22-21.

“We knew we had to get some inside run game going,” Silkowski said. “Tony [Gandolfi] did a great job; he ran hard like he always does. We knew we’d have to get him going a little bit.”

Mattoon got the ball back with 2:15 on the clock, but the Lincoln defense dug in and kept the Green Wave deep in its own territory, allowing only one first down on the final drive before intermission to keep the contest a 1-point game at halftime.

“That was huge to keep it within a score there,” Silkowski said after the game.

While the Railers trailed on the scoreboard at halftime, Silkowski said the team felt good about its chances of coming away with a victory.

“We knew we were there,” he said of the Railers’ halftime adjustments and gameplan for the second half. “We had the momentum at that point. We were running the ball at will. Anything we wanted to do was there for us. We were starting to play a little better defense at that point, so it was just ‘go down and score, then play good defense and get the ball back and we’ll go try to score again’…which we did.”

Elijah Pollice

Lincoln received the kickoff to start the second half and promptly marched down the field on a 7-play, 63-yard drive. Pollice kept the drive alive with a 19-yard scramble for a first down on a third-and-1 situation. With 8:32 left in the third quarter, Carson entered the end zone on a 3-yard TD run, and a 2-point conversion by Gandolfi gave Lincoln a 29-22 advantage for its first lead since the opening quarter.

Tony Gandolfi

On its next possession, the Green Wave drove to the Lincoln 6-yard line before turning the ball over on downs with 4:18 left in the third quarter. The Railers engineered an 11-play TD drive culminating with a 1-yard touchdown run by Gandolfi to make it 35-22.

Lincoln’s defense again held firm as Mattoon could only advance the ball near midfield before turning it back over to the Railers on downs with 8:30 left in the final stanza. The Green Wave defense, however, dug in and forced the Railers to punt on fourth-and-6. Lincoln punter Leadley booted the ball just short of the goal line, and although Lincoln dove and attempted to tip the ball back to give Mattoon possession deep in its own territory, the officials ruled that the ball broke the plane of the goal line, instead giving the Green Wave possession at its own 20-yard line with 5:31 remaining.

“Jaden [Leadley] is a heck of a punter,” Silkowski said. “We thought we’d be able to pin them.”

Mattoon quickly drove for a TD as Spurgeon scored on a 1-yard run with 4:14 left in the game to pull the Green Wave closer, 25-38.

Mattoon then recovered an onside kick but could not earn a first down. Lincoln took over on its own 27. A holding penalty on the first play backed the Railers up to their own 17. Lincoln couldn’t get a first down and punted with 2:12 left on the clock.

Lincoln’s defense held for three plays before Mattoon picked up a big first down on a fourth-and-9 pass play with 1:11 remaining. The Green Wave drove to the Lincoln 4-yard line before Spurgeon scrambled for a TD to pull Mattoon to within a point.

Mattoon lined up for a 2-point conversion to go for the win, but the Green Wave was whistled for a false start. On the second attempt at the conversion, Spurgeon’s pass fell incomplete to maintain the 35-34 advantage for Lincoln.

The Green Wave attempted another onside kick, but the Railers recovered with 16.6 seconds left and took a knee on their final play to earn the homecoming game victory.
 

According to unofficial statistics, Lincoln had two players break the 100-yard mark rushing, as Carson led the Railers with 121 yards on 14 carries and Pollice tallied 112 on 9 attempts. The Railers only attempted 3 passes in the contest, with Pollice going 1-for-2 for 26 yards and Decker completing his lone attempt on the first play of the game for 22 yards.

Isaac Decker

Overall, Mattoon unofficially outgained Lincoln in total offensive yards, 457 to 378. Mattoon compiled 202 passing yards and 255 rushing yards compared to Lincoln’s totals of 48 and 330 respectively.

Although pleased to come away with the victory, Silkowski said he’d like to see the Railers avoid any late-game drama by putting the opposition away when the opportunity presents itself.

“We were up by 14 at one point there; we’ve just got to close it out,” he said. “We got in that fourth down-and-6 and we had to punt; we were playing really good defense at that time. If we’d picked up some yardage there, we were going to go for it on fourth down, but it was kind of a ‘let’s see what we can do here on third down,’ but we lost yardage.

“We preach four things every week: stop the run, play with great attitude, play with great effort and finish. That’s our four keys to success every week; sometimes we have a fifth goal, but that’s our four values we believe over the week. We’re just going to keep preaching those things. We did three of those four well tonight, but if we’re going to beat Effingham next week, we’re going to have to go 4 for 4 there. Effingham has had our number, so we’re going to have our hands full next Friday night down there.”

With an overall record of 3-3, Lincoln needs to win two of its final three games to make the IHSA playoffs for the first time since 1984. Lincoln travels to Effingham for an Apollo Conference game next Friday. For those unable to make the 2-hour drive to Effingham to watch in person, WLCN 96.3 FM will stream full coverage of the game live via its YouTube channel. Access the livestream by visiting WLCNOnline.com and clicking the Watch live badge on the home page.

[Loyd Kirby]